[geeks] OSX Server

[Jonathan C. Patschke]

On Fri, 18 Mar 2005, Charles Shannon Hendrix wrote:

> It's the VM size when loaded that is huge.  Since most of it is shared,
> it is the dependencies that bother me the most.

It's not that hard to write lean code, even on Windows.  In fact, if you
stick to the Win32 API, and don't fold in a lot of unnecessary crap,
leanness pretty much comes "for free".

> Win32 and the internals of Windows are very complex and represent an
> acute form of dependency hell of their own.  This is without considering
> MFC and other add-ons.

Eh, maybe.  The only programs I've written for Windows that ever chewed
up more than 16MB of memory were either manipulating images or very very
large datasets.  Contrary to the way it looks, at the core of the
Windows API is a very lean set of function calls that give you access to
everything (even, with some labor, the shell API and OLE).

Most of the bloat in your typical Windows application comes from lazy
developers using layer upon layer of "convenience" functions (WindowsX,
MFC, etc.).

> Almost no Windows software sticks with only Win32, so the problem is
> largely the same for the average Windows user.

I'd say the problem is worse on GNOME and KDE.  It is -impossible- to
build lean software for either of those toolkits because so much of the
environment's functionality is separate from the window system.  In
Windows, you really can code "a la carte".

It really frustrates me that Microsoft has done so much to bloat,
insecure, and otherwise trash the really nice operating system at the
core of WindowsNT.  I don't use Windows on a daily basis any more
because of it, but I still get the occasional call from someone wanting
something written for it, and I do enjoy writing Windows sotware.

> UNIX and Windows manage memory differently, and report usage
> differently, so comparison is not simple.

Not so much.  Windows understands shared read-only pages just like Unix
does.

> Not that things like Xlib and the broken bits of libc are pretty...

Xlib is like a beat-to-hell farm truck.  It looks like hell and there's
nothing fun about using it, but it does get a lot of work done.  I'm a
fan of Motif and older GTK, myself.

-- 
Jonathan Patschke  )   "Once again, `digital' is proving to be a
Elgin, TX         (     synonym for `crap'."
USA                )                    --Andrew Orlowski on DRM